Leaving Cert Applied: A total of 3,404 students who entered to sit the Leaving Certificate Applied (LCA) programme yesterday faced an English and Communications paper which was described as "fair yet comprehensive."

According to Majella Deasy, a teacher at St Thomas's Community College in Bray, Co Dublin, students were in general very happy with the content of the written paper. This included sections on radio listenership figures, mini-companies, reality TV, applying for a job, as well as poetry and literature.

However, there were some complaints that parts of the audiovisual section, which involved questions on the news media, moved too quickly, she said. "I just talked to a few of them coming out. The main comment was that their hands were falling off from all the writing," she said. "But they didn't feel there were any trick questions . . . Students had lots of scope to write about their own experience."

John MacGabhann of the Teachers Union of Ireland also described yesterday's exam as " a very good paper which both exemplifies and justifies the purpose of the LCA".

"It has a very contemporary feel both in terms of the textual material and the demands made of students," he said. " It lives up to its title, which is English and Communications."

LCA students have already completed some 66 per cent of examinable work by the end of the summer term. This means this week's exams represent only a third of their overall results.

Yesterday's second paper, on social education, featured an aural section on teenage pregnancy. This was accompanied by short and long questions on areas such as social and health education, contemporary issues, and the community.

Denis Leonard, a teacher at St Peter's College, Dunboyne, Co Meath, described it as a "very good paper, which was very clear and very much in line with the format of other years."